The 101st Day of School

Today marks the 100th day of Kindergarten for Master J.  Despite the fact that I saw immense growth in my own K-Kids when I was a teacher, I am just amazed at how much Master J has grown socially, emotionally and academically.   What a sweetheart!  He and Mama designed a T-shirt to wear, but of course, Grandma had to give her Easy Press a work out and I designed a shirt to be worn tomorrow on the 101st day of school.  (A big shout - out to Charlotte C. for her enabling.  I LOVE this machine!) 

I used a dalmatian from Create a Critter, and the Carousel font for the number 101.  The "I survived" sentiment is cut from the Candice font.  The tally mark is a rounded card template, sliced, diced and welded together.  This was hardest part of the design and just in case you ever need it, here's the DS file.

https://design.cricut.com/#/design/85378155

Thanks for visiting today. Happy Hundredth Day J!   : ) Grandma Christine

Sometimes...

The paper is sooooo beautiful, you have to let it stand alone.  Love this new collection from Graphic 45.

Thanks for visiting with me today.  : ).     Happy Birthday, E!

You Melt My Heart - Penguin Valentine

When the new BBTB2 challenge pops in my feed on Monday, I generally check into DS and do a search to bring up images related to the challenge.  It's my quick way of reminding myself what's in the kajillions of images.  This week I searched for 'Penguins' and fell in love with an oldie but goodie from Animal Kingdom.  Then I went back to making Valentine cards, Valentine treats and looking for something to hang over the mantel. 

Valentine's Day!  A card for Master J. popped in my head  and here it is: -

I used a Happy Heart from Simply Charmed and removed the face using the contour button.  I stretched it out to kinda sorta look like an ice flow to ground my penguins.  The sentiment is from Holiday Cakes and the waves from The Quiet Book.  The background is embossed with the Cuttlebug Snowflakes folder.

I used the Country Life font for the inside sentiment - such a lovely, clear writing font. 

Now I can go back to the projects I SHOULD have been working on!   Thanks for visiting today.  : )  Christine

Birthday Card with a Faux Stacked Diamond Die

You know, it does take an awful lot of self control not to spend over my crafting budget every month!  For instance, the Simon Says Stamp Blog recently featured THE coolest diamond stacked die.  I could really see myself using that die as a background accent for cards, page titles, wall decor pieces etc, etc.  But when you add in taxes and shipping - I just could not justify ordering it. So, I fired up the Cricut, found an image of a lattice of diamonds on the CTMH Artiste cart and duplicated, welded, attached and played with it until I got something kinda sorta like the SSS die.  And here's the first card I made with it for my friend M's birthday.

I love the clean look of this card and I think the spray of flowers from Heartfelt Creations added just the right focal point.  Lovin' it! 

The inside sentiment comes from the Anna Griffin Garden Cards and Embellishments cart. Here's a closer look at the Cricut stacked diamonds.   I glued three pieces together to add dimension.

I am linking my card to the Birthday card challenge at BBTB2 here and the Something New challenge at the FCC blog here.

It's so nice to be able to just 'play' after the Christmas scurry to get things finished and before Valentine's Day cranks into high gear.  : )   Thanks for visiting with me today.  Christine

Edited to add DS file number:  https://design.cricut.com/#/design/79991108 
Have fun!
 

An Attempt at an Eclipse Card

The challenge at BBTB2 a couple of weeks ago was to incorporate a word into the design of your project and I was inspired to try an eclipse card.  Plus, I have so much Christmas designer paper that my storage drawers won't shut and I really need to use some of it up!

The cards I have seen on Pinterest use a short word like 'Noel' or 'Joy' because they are created with steel letter dies and need to be cut in a straight line and have no repeating letters.  However, since I was using my Cricut, I did not have these limits.  I chose to cut 'Ho Ho Ho' and decided to use the Art Deco font.  I simply sliced the words from the 5.25 x 4.0 designer paper rectangle, duplicated the letters in red twice and cut a red 5.5 x 4.25 mat and that's it!

Next I glued the designer paper mat to the red backing mat, then stacked and glued the Ho Ho Ho's together making sure the designer paper was on the top.  I added strips of foam tape to the back of the letters and matching the design, I glued them back in the designer paper mat.  Lastly I added the insides of the O's.

 You can see how the letters are stacked here.  I added a silhouette of Santa and his sleigh from the Christmas cart, and added a Santa from A Quilted Christmas inside.

The stamped sentiment comes from Sunny Studio.  The magic of this card comes as you move it about and the words pop out at you.  Really kinda cool!  Quick and easy too!

Of course, by the time I'd finished playing with my card design, the challenge was over.  : )  Good job there's a new one every week!   Thanks for visiting today.  : )  Christine

Finally, Halloween!

I hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!  We had lots of Trick or Treaters including several very cool inflatable costumes.  All our neighbors were out enjoying pizza and watching the over-excited little ones in the cul de sac running about and working off their sugar highs!

Here's a last few Halloweenie things to share before I get seriously into Thanksgiving...

SVG Cuts Candy Gang bags for the neighbor kids. 

By the time the older kids arrived, we were handing out spider rings and Tootsie Rolls : )  The mummy was my favorite because he was so delightfully inky!  I made these for my DGDs.

Tim Holtz Village dies Haunted Houses.  Love, love, love the versatility of these dies.

These little matchbox treats were for the shelter children.  I cut the boxes and wraps by hand and the decorations came from Mini Monsters, Create a Critter 2, Happy Hauntings, Charmed, Smiley Cards and Hello Kitty.

The boxes are just big enough to hold 3 nuggets and the Hello Kitty bat was their hands down favorite! 

Thanks for visiting with me today!   : )  Christine

A Little Batty

A quick post to share the bat wall decor I made for my DGD using the Holiday One Cut Gallery image set available in DS.  

Backing the cut with different colors of glitter paper results in very a different look and feel.  I really, really liked the neon green, but DH reminded me that I needed to cut a moon and stars for the outside and did I want green stars?  Sigh!   Purple looks spooky too and orange, fabulous!  Maybe I should just cut several of them with different glitter backings and group them together in a decor piece.  Oh yeah! Sounds like a plan to me.  : )

Thanks for visiting with me today and putting up with my ramblings!   : )  Christine